What is nuclear energy? Shrink down to an atom and find out

We use electricity to power every aspect of our lives Simple stuff like making a cup of tea or powering our tablets and phones. We are on a journey to find out where are some of this electricity comes from. We're inside a nuclear reactor and if you look below you you'll see we're travelling downwards towards the reactor core this system has just been refueled - it is powered by fuel rods that contain uranium which is a natural element that is mined from deep in the ground We keep it here inside these metal rods. Let's take a look inside the system is about to be switched back on to see how uranium makes energy we'll need to get smaller though Now we're shrinking to an atomic level here right in front of you, there's rows and rows of uranium pellets, in total there are over two million fuel pellets in the whole reactor and it's inside these pellets - each only a centimeter tall - that nuclear fission happens. Let's get even closer at this scale we can see actual atoms and neutrons Neutrons are the particles that help us unlock all that energy from the nucleus but they move fast so first we need to slow one down and to do that we simply use water Let's follow this one and see where it leads us. Pay close attention Firing this neutron into the nucleus of the atom causes the nucleus to split in two This is fission we mentioned earlier and as the nucleus splits it releases its own neutrons Some of these newly released neutrons slowed, by the water hit other atoms causing more fissions and so the chain reaction begins. In our reactor there are an incredible five million million fissions per pellet per second Look around you and you'll see them happening everywhere Each time our uranium nucleus splits it releases its awesome energy. This energy heats the fuel pellets and in turn the water in the reactor to more than 300 degrees Celsius. The powerful chain reaction has heated the water in the reactor core and this heat at high pressure water now travels through pipes out of the reactor vessel at 35 miles per hour. It all sounds very dramatic but understanding the physics means we know how to regulate the chain reaction in the space beyond the pipe the heat from that water turns more water into steam This steam is what drives the turbines All of that power just to make a turbine spin, it's really quite a simple system These steam driven turbines generate more than a thousand megawatts of electricity. That's roughly enough to power all of the houses in Greater Manchester. All of the steam leaving the turbine is condensed back into water and pumped back round to the steam generators to be turned back into steam again. So here we are back in the main reactor where we started, you see the simplicity of this system makes nuclear power incredibly effective. As you've seen with nuclear a little goes a very long way Something to think about when you next make a cup of tea or charge your tablet.

Channel: EDF 🇬🇧

Views: 13,766,428

Rating: 4.7270346 out of 5

Keywords: nuclear, fission, 360, vr, virtual reality, power, energy, electricity, edf, edf energy, atoms, power station

Id: 6K5gy3RLcKc

Length: 3min 41sec (221 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 19 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/Voice_of_Season]

Are there any videos on how nuclear radiation affects humans on a molecular level.? We saw it on an exterior level in the show, but I would like to see it on a molecular level like we saw in this video with a nuclear reactor.

[u/Gludens]

Nice video, thanks

[u/Skyhawk6600]

Didn't realize it was vr kinda fucked with me for a moment